canon camera user doc style

[Jessica Weissman]

I bought a new Canon camera over the weekend.  The camera is a complex
marvel that lets me take better pictures than my old camera did, but
that's not what we're interested here.

The thing came with several manuals (some with English and Spanish
versions bound separately), including a "Basics" manual and a complete
user manual. There is also a separate software manual.  What's
interesting to me is that the advanced manual is full of details, but
does not cover the basics of operation in any way.  There's a list of
functions that operate in different modes, there's lots of detailed
coverage of all the obscure options, there are several diagrams of all
the controls with names, but there is nothing that says "Here's how you
turn on the camera, here's how you select among the major modes, here's
what this strange button does."  

In other words, even a former rocket scientist/current tech writer with
lots of camera experience and even more experience decoding consumer
electronics manuals could not figure out from the big manual how to do
the basic operations.

Fortunately, the Basics manual has all that laid out in an easy to
understand format.

What's your opinion of this way of configuring the manuals?  I'm glad
there's a short non-intimidating manual that gives the basic operational
information, but found the advanced manual odd.  Why not add a few pages
on the basics to the advanced manual?

Jessica Weissman
Hillcrest Laboratories